When Jules Favre went to Versailles to negotiate with the German emperor and his chancellor for the surrender of Paris, he was accompanied, on his second and subsequent visits, by a young officer of ordnance, Count d'Hérisson, who attended him as a sort of aide-de-camp. Nothing could be less alike than the two men: Jules Favre, of the upper middle class in life, deeply sorrowful, oppressed by his responsibility, and profoundly conscious of his situation; and the young man whose birth placed him in the ranks of the _jeunesse dorée_, pleased to find himself in plenty and in good society, and allowing his spirits to rise with even more than national buoyancy, when, for a moment, the pressure of trouble was removed. D'Hérisson published an account of his experience while at the Prussian headquarters, which gives so vivid a picture of Count Bismarck, the great chancellor of the German Empire, that I here venture to repeat some parts of his narrative. He says,-- "On January 23 I received a summons from Jules Favre. He seized me by both hands, and asked me to carry, early the next morning, a despatch to M. de Bismarck, and to get it into his hands before daybreak. No one was to know of this despatch except the German officer bearing a flag of truce, to whom I was to give it with my own hand. 'Then all is over?' I said to Jules Favre. 'Yes,' he answered, 'we have only bread enough for a few more days. God only knows what the people of Paris may do to us when we are forced to let them know the truth. We must do our best to guard against the disastrous consequences of their strong feeling of patriotism. The Government does not intend to rid itself of its responsibilities, but its first duty is to provide bread for the capital.' "With some difficulty," continued d'Hérisson, "I reached Sèvres, and the next morning before daybreak gave Jules Favre's letter to the Prussian officer. I sent back an express to Jules Favre with the news, and then went to Baron Rothschild's desolated villa at Suresnes to wait the answer. Two hours later, came a message from the French officer commanding the nearest outpost to say that a flag of truce had brought word that M. de Bismarck would see M. Jules Favre, and that a carriage would be in waiting on the left bank of the Seine to take him to headquarters." This knowledge of the negotiation at the French outposts was a disclosure that Jules Favre had desired to avoid. "When I brought Jules Favre the news," continues d'Hérisson, "he was greatly moved. His hands trembled so that he could hardly break the seal of the letter." [Illustration: _JULES FAVRE_.]